Wednesday, February 18, 2009

The Supreme Court of Canada has reserved judgement, as it was expected to do, in an important appeal that has broad implications for investigative and hard-hitting journalism in Canada. The appeal involves a $125,000 libel judgement against the Ottawa Citizen.

The appeal hinges on whether journalists can defeat libel claims even if some of their facts turn out to be unproven, as long as they acted fairly and in the public interest. This is a standard that is upheld elsewhere in the world and media lawyers for many of Canada's largest newspaper publishers argued it should be Canada's standard, too.